


Hold Onto Me 'Till It's Over

by Rìgh_Marbh (Righ_Marbh)



Series: Another Day [1]
Category: The Last Kingdom (TV)
Genre: M/M, Pre-Relationship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-23
Updated: 2020-07-23
Packaged: 2021-03-04 18:28:49
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,463
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25470904
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Righ_Marbh/pseuds/R%C3%ACgh_Marbh
Summary: Aaaaaaand we have my first Round 2 Prompt Fill for tlkfanficfest! This time with Prompt 41 - "Finan watches Sihtric sleep."Sihtric tosses and turns in his sleep and Finan is certain it's because the scruffy little bastard is about to get them all killed.
Relationships: Finan/Sihtric (The Last Kingdom)
Series: Another Day [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1844980
Comments: 6
Kudos: 45
Collections: The Last Kingdom Fanfic Fest





	Hold Onto Me 'Till It's Over

Finan’s problem isn’t nightmares. Oh, he has them occasionally the same as everyone else but it’s when he’s stuck keeping watch on his own that he finds the memories creeping up on him in the dark and making the trees twist and warp in front of his eyes. The first few nights it happened he tried to stare into the dying fire in the hopes the light would chase away the life he’ll never go back to but it’s no use because his mind turns the glowing cracks in the firewood into faces of people he’d rather forget and every bird’s call sounds like someone calling his name and it means he makes a useless watchman but like hell is he letting anyone else know that.

Then he tries distracting himself another way - he prays, but the words feel bitter on his tongue and after what they’ve been through it will take some time to not feel abandoned by the Almighty, and then he tries muttering the words to old songs he used to know but _Christ_ that hurts so he gives it up quickly.

One night though, when Finan is bone tired but still in better shape than the rest of them, and he’s taking the first watch just as the last of the light is beginning to fade, he rests his eyes on where Sihtric is tossing and turning in a light sleep and just...watches. The memories don’t come, the birds hunting in the night just sound like birds, and when he nudges Uhtred awake once the moon is at it’s peak he lies down across the fire from the Dane and is asleep before he knows it.

The fact that his eyes rest on Sihtric every time he takes a watch on the journey to Dunholm is, well, it’s irrelevant. He still doesn’t entirely trust him and he’s half convinced that all of the tossing and turning is because the little bastard has set up some trap and his conscience is bothering him. And if he takes to watching him whilst they’re riding, what of it? He’s got good reason to be suspicious and there’s a dark look in Sihtric’s eye he doesn’t like.

By the time it’s over and done with and they’ve finally made it to Coccham, Sihtric looks dead on his feet and Finan can’t take it any more. He corners him out the back of Uhtred’s new hall, grabs him by the scruff of the neck and throws him against the wall. Sihtric knows full well that there’s no love lost between them and there’s a scuffle but it’s one Finan was always going to win and it ends with Sihtric pinned firmly against the wall, blinking in the light of the setting sun.

“Now, ye little brat, you’re going to tell me what your problem is.”

He struggles briefly but Finan’s grip on his tunic is firm and he quickly gives up, slumping back against the wall.

“Why do you care? Are you not the one who would rather I had died getting us into Dunholm?”

“I never said that.”

“You didn’t need to.”

And Jesus the defeat in his voice _hurts_. Oh his eyes are still dark with resentment and Finan didn’t doubt that this scruffy little bastard would meet his death with defiance in his eyes and a snarl in his throat but beneath all of that there was nothing left but exhaustion.

Finan releases his grip on Sihtric’s tunic and instead rests his hands on either side of his head.

“Just because I thought...”

“That I would betray my Lord?”

“You did it once to join Uhtred.”

He just sighs.

“I had no choice in serving Kjartan...he was my father, I was born to it. I...”

And that’s when the scale of the mistake he’s made hits him so hard his knees nearly buckle. Somewhere at the back of his mind he remembers it maybe being mentioned off hand that Sihtric was Kjartan’s bastard but...but it never went in. All this time he’s been so caught up in thinking that the tossing and turning was over some future betrayal that he’d forgotten...how could he have forgotten!?

“ _Mic an damnaidh_...I...I didn’t know.”

Sihtric says nothing, he just lets his head fall back against the wall with a distant, pained expression and Finan can feel a swell of...of...something in his chest. An unholy mix of rage and shame and bitter disappointment in himself for not realising that this scruffy, dark-eyed little menace had all but single-handedly delivered his own father into the hands of his most bitter enemies to satisfy the blood feud of a man he barely knew.

To his credit, Sihtric doesn’t cry even though Finan is close enough to see the tears threatening to spill. He also won’t look Finan in the eye so he levers himself off of the wall and takes Sihtric’s head in his hands and presses their foreheads together.

“You listen to me...you...he...” Sihtric is watching him warily as he struggles to find the words and he knows that what he says next will either fix everything or put their relationship beyond salvage. “...do not lose sleep over that piece of shit.”

“The Gods do not look kindly on kin-slayers.”

“Yours and mine both...but you didn’t kill him. Ragnar didn’t even kill him. Kjartan sowed the seeds of his own destruction a long time ago and you are not responsible for the mistakes he made before you were ever born.”

Sihtric is shaking, ever so slightly, under his hands. It’s not fear - Finan knows this stage of fatigue so well he can almost time how long it will take for him to collapse. There’s time, though, to try and fix this.

“And if the Gods disagree? If they decide to punish me?”

Finan doesn’t really know what to say to it. He knows a little of their Gods...he’s picked up scraps of information and odd bits of stories but he doesn’t know how to answer that.

“Then they’ll have to go through me first.” It’s stupid. Only that morning he was half certain Sihtric was going slip away in the night and give the signal for the hall to be burned to the ground and now he’s nose-to-nose with him, placing one had on the cross around his neck and the other on the hammer laying on Sihtric’s chest and swearing he’ll keep him safe from Gods he doesn’t even believe in. “I mean it. Stay with me and get some fucking sleep before you drop dead...I’ll keep watch.”

Sihtric huffs out something that might have been a laugh. There’s definitely a softer edge to his eyes now and Finan decides that maybe he has done the right thing for once.

“And you’ll fight the Gods if they come for me?”

And Finan knows he’s teasing now but something _else_ is happening here in this hidden little corner of Coccham and he doesn’t know what it is but he feels the world shift beneath his feet all the same.

“And I will fight the Gods for you.”

Finan steps back. He gives Sihtric plenty of space to turn around and walk away even though he can feel the weight of whatever he’s started trying to pull them back together. He holds out his hand.

And for some reason Sihtric actually takes it and follows him back into the hall.

They’re all piled into the hall until more houses can be built or repaired and it’s easy to slip unseen along the walls and up to the small, secluded corner Finan has staked out for himself. It’s on the first floor, above the door and shielded from both the cool breeze and prying eyes by a heavy woollen curtain. In time it will be little more than a store room but for now it’s a makeshift bedroom.

Sihtric is swaying on his feet by the time Finan has unbuckled his armour and shrugged out of it. He throws back some of the furs and lowers himself to the ground, sitting back against the wall and waiting.

“You can’t keep standing much longer.”

Despite the weight of sleep dragging him down, Sihtric’s eyes sweep over the tiny space with a calculating look before he slowly, almost gingerly, lowers himself to lie between Finan’s legs, his head on his chest. When Finan runs one hand lightly through his hair, his eyes flicker closed and he’s asleep in moments.

And Finan watches him, watches over him, until the light fails and his memories begins to swirl around him. As the dark begins to press in on the, he fold his arms across Sihtric’s chest and closes his eyes.


End file.
